Your Next Good Move: Hire a Collaboration Consultant

What the hell is a collaboration consultant? Damn girl, we thought you'd never ask. It's like the ultimate hybrid of PR, marketing, cross promotion, and strategic partnerships. If you're a female entrepreneur, your ears should be perking up by now.

For most first-time business owners and freelancers, hiring a PR agency or marketing firm to get the word out about your business is just not in the budget. (We're talkin' 5-figures and up for a monthly retainer alone.) And while collaboration consulting is certainly no replacement for the value good PR and marketing agencies bring to the table, it's a good first step because its main goal is to build strategic partnerships using what your mama gave you.

When you're just starting out, your numbers are typically low across the board –followers, subscribers, sales – you name it. But you need to leverage what you've got and be smart about the brands your align yourself with. Enter Baily Hancock, collaboration consultant and professional friend-maker. She finds the right brands for you to partner with, builds those relationships, and creates opportunities for cross promotion so that everybody wins. And while you might feel like you don't have much to offer as a newbie, Baily will gladly show you otherwise.

Cross promotion is a great way to gain exposure for your product/service/event in an organic way, and it goes well beyond Instagram mentions and Facebook posts. By having a pro lay the groundwork for strategic partnerships, you can capitalize on opportunities you totally would have missed while you're in "Eff, how am i going to make this work?" mode of running your new business. Plus you'll pave the way for future opportunities down the road. For any new business, and especially in this community of female entrepreneurs, relationships are the name of the game. And if you're so-awkward-what-do-I-do-with-my-hands like we are, it helps to have a friend in your corner to do the initial outreach. Catch Baily in action tonight or at one of her upcoming events.